Tuesday, 17 August 2010

Sempai Me.

Wow, has it really been two weeks since I last wrote about karate? Blimey. I was off work last week with the kids to give my parents a break (summer holidays are a killer on your childcare arrangements) and the week just seems to have gotten swallowed up in a black hole of Disney channel, Moshi Monsters, park visits and icecream eating.

So, what's been going on in Cookie family karate land? As I mentioned last time, Shihan and Sensei Chrissie have been on holiday the last few weeks leaving us in the very capable hands of Sensei H. It was really interesting having a different instructor. I love how you get a whole new take on things which can really help cement your learning.

Shihan and Sensei being absent also left a Sempai spot empty for Gracie's class which I happily stepped in to fill. What a great experience that was. The kids are great (for the most part) and it's fun to help them learn and to see them progressing. It was quite funny as they're all a little bit afraid of Sensei H (I told Grace that she was the master of wicked warm up session and I think it might have filtered down to the rest of the class! LOL). She certainly didn't take any nonsense from any of them and gave them a good drilling in basics as well as some fun games (with a little healthy competition). All in all it was a really good experience and I wouldn't hesitate to do it again.

She was a little less gentle for the Monday adult class - my gluts are killing me this morning from holding stances forever! I know the only way to get better at my stances is to work them though so I don't really mind.

The Sunday class was particular cosy this week with just 4 of us in attendance (Kendo was busy at home cleaning up after having removed our old back boiler and hot water tank - what a messy job that's turned out to be!). It was a good opportunity to work on kihon for us, especially some of the advanced strikes and stances, and to work on kata. The great thing about there being so few students is that Sensei was able to pick up on areas where our stances aren't quite right, or our blocks/angles needed tweaking. That one on one time for kata is invaluable I think. We could quite easily go along doing it incorrectly otherwise. I'd much rather be picked up on it now so I can make sure its getting imbedded in my muscle memory the RIGHT way!

It's back to business as usual from next week so we'll see what interesting stuff Shihan has dreamt up for us while he's been relaxing on his hols. I dread to think what he could have come up with with all that time on his hands. I imagine it'll probably hurt though! LOL.

About Me

About this Blog

What's this all about? Somewhere to keep a record of my journey as a Karateka. Tales of karate highs and lows for the whole Cookieblog family. Kiai!

A Little Disclaimer.

I feel I should put this on here.

The stuff I've talked about/will talk about on this blog is MY experience of Karate, at MY karate club. It's unique to me. I'm pretty sure even my Shihan and Sensai's might disagree with my interpretations of some stuff. That said, my experience is my experience. I see what I see, I feel what I feel, I write what I write. There's no right or wrong in that.

If you should see something however, that completely offends your Karate sensibilities, then I won't mind if you mention it, in a nice kind of way. You might even change my way of thinking. I'm new to this. My ideas are evolving. I certainly don't know everything, I probably never will. But I'm enjoying the learning curve.